Torn From The Front Page: Firefighters did what had to be done with contract OK; other unions should follow suit

Bay City firefighters union President Kurt Wagner called last week’s 11th-hour approval of a contract, which saved jobs, “bittersweet” given all of the emotion and drama leading up to it.

These are bittersweet times for everyone, union and nonunion, lucky enough to still have a job and a home whose mortgage they can afford to pay.

They are bittersweet times for the city, too, which faced a $1.66 million budget deficit going into the 2010-2011 fiscal year that began July 1.

There’s enough money to run the city, but not enough to keep running it the way it has been in the past.

That’s why the City Commission months ago asked the eight unions, and non-union workers, to help reduce the red ink by cutting labor costs by 10.8 percent.

Barring that, the jobs of more than 42 city employees were on the line.

Even so, none but the firefighters’ union had reached a tentative agreement by the June 30 deadline. With the new fiscal year under way, layoffs have already begun.

No Bay City firefighters will be among them. By approving their contract, they saved five from their department from layoff.

The Bay City Commission passed a resolution last month that would allow laid-off employees to be called back to work if contracts are ratified by Aug. 31.

Layoffs will continue if concessions aren’t made and contracts ratified by the deadline.

As it stands with the firefighters, the City Commission is scheduled July 12 to vote on the contract. Negotiators on both sides had agreed to the terms, so we’re not sure what Commission President Christopher Shannon’s angle is with his public doubts that firefighters hit the 10.8 percent mark.

The city’s other unions need to follow the firefighters’ example and do what must be done.

Few could have imagined how deeply this recession would affect our community or how long it would linger.

Few could have imagined an economy in which cuts in pay and benefits would all but become standard operating procedure in the public and private sectors as revenue and profits dried up.

Few could have imagined how routine it would be for people to be put out of work or have their homes foreclosed.

Those people in our community who are fortunate enough to be employed don’t like what they’ve had to give up or the added responsibilities they’ve had to take on to remain that way. But complaining — or, in the unions’ case, trying to play hardball — does no good.

The money just isn’t there to maintain the status quo or, for that matter, anything like it. Bay City has to get lean.

It’s come down to this: wages or workers. One or the other must be cut. Reducing the first is bittersweet. But reducing the second has no sweetness to it at all.